Full Freeview on the Rowridge (Isle Of Wight, England) transmitter

The symbol shows the location of the Rowridge (Isle Of Wight, England) transmitter which serves 620,000 homes. The bright green areas shown where the signal from this transmitter is strong, dark green areas are poorer signals. Those parts shown in yellow may have interference on the same frequency from other masts.

Are there any planned engineering works or unexpected transmitter faults on the Rowridge (Isle Of Wight, England) mast?

ROWRIDGE transmitter - DAB: BBC National DAB Radio Weak Signal from 11:00 on 14 Aug to 13:22 on 14 Aug.

orange background for multiplexes names moregreen background for transmission frequencieslilac background for power levels in watts800MHz band: 4G mobile started in 2013700MHz band: 4G from 30 June 2020more600MHz band: new or moved digital TV services moreNotes: + and - denote 166kHz offset; aerial group are shown as ABC/DEKWItalics for analogue, digital switchover was Wednesdays 7th March and 21st March 2012.

Other local maps

Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Rowridge transmitter area

Aug 1958-Jan 1992

Southern Television

Jan 1982-Dec 1992

Television South (TVS)

Jan 1993-Feb 2004

Meridian

Feb 2004-Dec 2014

ITV plc

Feb 1983-Dec 1992

TV-am•

Jan 1993-Sep 2010

GMTV•

Sep 2010-Dec 2014

ITV Daybreak•

• Breakfast ◊ Weekends ♦ Friday night and weekends † Weekdays only. Rowridge was not an original Channel 3 VHF 405-line mast: the historical information shown is the details of the company responsible for the transmitter when it began transmitting Channel 3.

I continually have problems with BBC4 HD reception from Rowridge, presumably because COM7 is broadcast at half the power of other channels. It seems pointless for BBC to take great care with the production values of wildlife films and dramas and then compromise at the transmitter.

R Murchie: The BBC don't decide the transmitterpower levels, the maximum levels are set by Ofcom and has to be lower for COM7 & COM8 on most transmitters because the same frequencies are being reused more than the frequencies of PSB1-3 & COM4-6 so using higher power levels would cause more interference and reduce the number of households who can receive COM7&8.

Haven't checked here for a while, but looking now at the channel list, it appears that Rowridge VP Com mux have been reduced in power from 200,000W to only 50,000W.

Is this a mistake?
I use VP as all the mux were originally 200,000W, which is why I use it. I only came to check on a mux today that was giving me some low quality problems last night, so if there has been a reduction in power, then that might be why.

Surely having VP the same power as HP on the Com mux is pointless and goes against the reason we got VP in the first place.

Mike T: There have been now power reductions at any transmitters (other than temporarily due to faults or engineering work) so it appears that an error has crept in to the data for Rowridge VP somewhere.

R Murchie: We also have the same problems in the outer reaches of Rowridge coverage in Dorset - BBC4 HD present sometimes and then not. Fortunately we only use Freeview as a reserve with the great majority of our viewing by satellite using either a Manhattan HD Freesat box or our Technomate HD generic receiver fed from a second motorised dish. Also, interestingly and not really anticipated by me, our broadband streaming activity is steadily increasing.

Tony Hill: Understood, but I find that Freesat is subject to adverse weather conditions, and the BBC iPlayerpicture does not really compare with an HD broadcast. I will see what Ofcom have to say about disadvantaging a PBS broadcaster that we have to pay for.

If your satellitereception is seriously affected by weather then you either have the wrong size dish (too small) or an alignment fault. The oft fitted 35 cm dish is far too small for most parts of the UK in my extensive experience. The smallest for your area should be at least a 50 cm or maybe a 60 cm one. (I use a 60 cm in Trowbridge and have no weather problems.) So with a decent size dish your Freesat reception should be very good and uninterrupted unless we have a blizzard of polar proportions!

Your TV licence is to allow you to operate TV receiving equipment to watch live broadcasts or catch-up on the BBC iPlayer. So Ofcom will probably not respond to your suggested enquiry.

MikeP: And to add that since Iplayer is at 720p and HD broadcast is at 1080i, if you take into account the sets own upscaling, there shouldn't be a vast amount of difference between the two, at least after a minute or two.

If you have other problems, please provide a full (not partial) postcode (or preferably enter it in box at the top right) and indicate where if aerial is on the roof, in the loft or elsewhere.

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